"Now, I am capable of paying for food, health care and school fees for my kids," says Bembeleza, one of the 5,082 people who have benefited from our cash assistance distribution in Kitchanga town, Democratic Republic of the Congo.

Thousands of displaced families in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DR Congo) struggle to make ends meet. With cash distributions made available by our teams in the field over 8,000 families are able to buy exactly what they need.

All displaced people face challenges, but among the most vulnerable of those in search of protection are women and girls. "Being a woman is harder when you are displaced," says Director of NRC's field operations, Magnhild Vasset.

Violence has forced thousands of Congolese to seek safety in neighbouring Uganda, with overcrowded refugee camps there putting pressure on hygiene and sanitation facilities, increasing the risk of deadly cholera outbreaks.

Violence in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DR Congo) has forced nearly 44,000 people to cross Uganda’s south-west border out of the country so far this year. This has put pressure on sanitation facilities in refugee settlements, and has led to deadly cholera outbreaks.

Alarm bells ring as violence by hundreds of armed groups worsens in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). Despite 13 million people now needing emergency assistance, the aid response falls far from meeting even minimum lifesaving needs in worst affected areas.

"World leaders and public attention have failed to grasp that Congo's wars have returned on an enormous scale. Armed men attack and abuse defenceless women and children every day, displacing millions," said Egeland.

In September 2016, the UN General Assembly adopted the New York Declaration for Refugees and Migrants. UN Member States committed to strengthening and enhancing mechanisms to protect refugees and migrants and to move towards a more effective system of responsibility sharing in the international refugee response. States committed to working towards the adoption of a Global Compact on Refugees in 2018, to consist of a Comprehensive Refugee Response Framework (CRRF) and a Programme of Action for implementation.

Last week the Democratic Republic of the Congo was declared the country worst affected by conflict displacement in the world. The crisis is set to worsen ahead of planned elections in 2018. Here are five things you need to know about Africa’s looming mega-crisis.

#1. Top of the charts

DR Congo has been declared the worst affected by displacement in the world by the global analysts, IDMC. A surge in violence that started in 2016 has forced over 1.7 million people to flee their homes this year alone; that’s over 5,500 people per day.

Nowhere have more people been forced to flee in the first six months of this year than in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DR Congo), according to a major report released today by the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre (IDMC).

“It’s a mega crisis. The scale of people fleeing violence is off the charts, outpacing Syria, Yemen and Iraq,” said the Norwegian Refugee Council’s (NRC) Country Director in DRC, Ulrika Blom.

People displaced by violence in Tanganyika province in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo face appalling living conditions, a humanitarian assessment reveals.

“Tanganyika is on the brink of a deadly disaster. It’s catastrophic cocktail about to blow up,” warned Ulrika Blom, the Norwegian Refugee Council’s (NRC) country director in DR Congo. “The province is a forgotten crisis within a forgotten crisis.”

The education situation in DR Congo is alarming, with 7.4 million children out of school across the country. Despite this, only 4 per cent of humanitarian funds have been received for education, 9 months into the year.

“The dire education funding situation puts many children at risk of illiteracy, and puts them at a disadvantage for finding future employment for generations,” warned Celestin Kamori, the Norwegian Refugee Council’s (NRC) education programme coordinator in DR Congo.

While students around the world go back to school, millions of children that fled conflict and drought in East Africa have no classes to attend.

“We decided to flee Burundi because there was war. I miss the school where I was studying in Burundi. I had enough materials: shoes and clothes, pens, eraser and a school bag,” says ten-year-old Nyongere at Nduta refugee camp in Tanzania. But this year he has no school to attend.

“The people of the Kasais are the first to put into practice the number one humanitarian principle: Humanity,” says our Protection expert Anne Davies after visiting the Kasai region in the Democratic Republic of Congo in July.
Kasai used to be a peaceful area, but is now experiencing violent clashes between local militas and government forces - leading to suffering among millions of civilians.

Journalists are often harassed and arrested in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Tanzania. That didn’t stop Jonathan from starting his own radio station.
When Jonathan first arrived in Tanzania’s Nyarugusu refugee camp in 1997, he was wary. There was little information circulating about issues affecting the camp´s residents. In Nyarugusu, one of the largest refugee camps in the world, things were happening. But nobody knew about them.

Almost a million people have been forced to flee inside the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) in the first six months of the year. This is the highest number globally of people internally displaced by conflict, according to the mid-year report released today by the Internal Displacement Monitoring Centre.

ProCap aims to strengthen the collaborative response of protection agencies and non-protection mandated organisations. To do this, it deploys senior personnel with proven protection expertise at field, regional and global operations and trains mid-level protection staff from standby partners and humanitarian organisations. The Project objectives and activities are guided by the 2014-2016 ProCap Strategy.

The numbers were bleak. Nearly 66 million people were on the move, fleeing conflict and disaster. But we persevered.

In 2016, displacement figures topped the charts yet again. As the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC) scaled up, our 2016 annual report details, we supported more than six million people throughout the year – improving 2015 achievements by nearly 27 per cent.